


A Heart Laid To Waste

by hydesboy



Category: Howl Series - Diana Wynne Jones, Howl's Moving Castle - All Media Types
Genre: Pre-Canon, mutually unhealthy relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-16
Updated: 2021-03-16
Packaged: 2021-03-24 23:22:02
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,654
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30079911
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hydesboy/pseuds/hydesboy
Summary: Pre-canon story, exploring the events leading up to Howl being cursed and the unfortunate nature of Howl and the Witch of the Waste's past(Featuring me throwing a random name at the Witch because she doesn't have an actual canon name, and also some uncomfortable interactions that I cringed at and don't support)
Relationships: Howl Pendragon/Witch of the Waste
Kudos: 7





	A Heart Laid To Waste

"Your hair is the prettiest red I have ever seen." remarked the wizard, the words slipping lazily from his clumsily upturned mouth. As he spoke, he distractedly trailed his fingers through the flame-like red hair of the woman, not once hitting a snag as he did so.

"I know it is." returned the witch, a certain smugness weaving itself through each and every word she spoke. She so loved her hair, the enchantments she had cast over it to keep it looking so lovely was, she was quite sure, well worth the hassle that came from the maintenance of it.

The air was heavy and warm, but with a few charms and spells at play, it was far more tolerable than the overbearing heat of the Waste just beyond the walls of the ornate, if not somewhat gloomy building. The building, a palace and prison at the same time, was deceptively labyrinthine, and at the centre was a stylishly decorated living room, filled with what the owner had gathered over the years in an attempt at creating a sense of normality in the uninhabitable space she had been forced into. Against one of the walls - how many walls were there? - in one of the cooler nooks was a large plush couch and upon the couch were the only two people in all of the Waste. With her hair untied and flowing down like waves, the Witch of the Waste looked as if she had stepped right out of a Pre-Raphaelitic artwork. Her attention was cast downward, regarding the man who rested his head upon her lap with a strange mix of fondness and contempt. The man with hair of - presently, until he grew bored of the colour - spun gold looked up at the witch, which seemed to be a consistent as she was at least a head and a half taller than him even when he was in his tallest heeled boots, let a particularly dazzling smile cross his features. The smile upon Howl Pendragon's face was the sort that quite distracted from the fact that his eyes were in a perpetual state of green glassy emptiness.

"Cordula?" asked he, speaking the name that she had first introduced herself as, even if he suspected it might have been an alias, "Do you love me?" This was a question he often asked those poor unfortunate souls that he set about courting, waiting until the moment that the affirmative was a little bit too sincere for him to leave.

"More than you would ever believe." crooned the woman, settling one hand gently yet possessively upon the man's chest just above where his heart had once been, her nails, long and painted a rich red, trailing patterns upon the exposed skin she found there, leaving little marks of a pattern that faded away before any real shape could be determined in her wake. "You love me too, I know that you do. Had you a heart I am quite sure I would feel it fluttering beneath my hand."

Neither of them were really capable of love. Not really, not properly. They looked lovely together, which worked wonderfully for the vain pair, but that was as far as it went. Even sitting there alone, the witch in her crushed velvets of black and silver and the wizard in his ruffles and laces of his very much open shirt and the royal purple trousers and waistcoat - it would be reminisce to not mention the cloak that accompanied this outfit, a deep purple with golden constellations that flickered and seemed to match whatever shone in the night sky at any given day - they seemed to be a portrait brought to life, and no more real than an artwork.

It had gotten late, the getting-late stage having already slipped past a long while ago. Howl had needed to leave before the sun began its decent, and yet the sky was as dark as it could be and he was still there. It was not safe to travel the Waste at night, he had heard this time and time again, and was far too much of a coward to test this. It was said that there were creatures out there that emerged at night once the heat became something little less intolerable, creatures that he knew as a fact that he did not want to come face to face with if he could avoid it.  
He did want to get home, he'd left Michael fumbling over one of the easier books of his, the lad having only appeared on his doorstep somewhat recently and it seemed unwise to leave him there alone. Less so because he was leaving a child alone with nothing but a fire demon to supervise him, but rather because of the fact there was an unsupervised child just trying to learn to use magic.

"Is that so?" Howl replied, putting on something akin to a purr to his voice, sounding wonderfully genuine with this. It was fortunate that the one he was speaking was leaning over in the way she was, otherwise when he raised his hand to caress her cheek he would have fallen short. He had planned on making some grand show of breaking her heart, but it had gotten late and he did not fancy traveling at such an hour through such unpleasant environments, even with magical means on his side.

"It is," she returned, "The beautiful, beautiful man that you are, surely you recognises how lovely you and I look together. There is not a soul that could be more powerful than we are together, and together we could rule the world."

The wizard flinched.

It was not only her words that caused him to flinch, though that was not entirely out of the question, he didn't want to rule anything at all, he just wanted to live in peace without being bothered too much. No, what caused him to flinch was that the witch drew blood. Her nails were sharp and a well timed jolt of her hand was all that was needed to cut him, the paint of her nails matching the colour of his blood.  
Unfortunately, it seemed that the alarmed, and admittedly somewhat undignified squeak that he let out at this was precisely what she had been hoping for.  
A second and then third mark joined the first before he was able to successfully haul himself up to a proper sitting position, shuffling about so he did not have his back turned towards her. With his eyes wide, close enough to being a show of alarm, one hand fluttering to his chest, cautiously testing the now tender area of his exposed skin. The way the blood bubbled out was odd, without his heart it was sluggish, his breath being the only thing that forced it to creep out from his skin.

"You cut me!" he exclaimed, his voice radiating with clear shock and alarm.

"Yes," returned the woman, sounding far too nonchalant given that she was rubbing blood between her fingertips, "Oh don't look at me like that. Such a cold glare, you have no right to look at me in such a way. Be a good boy and come back here now." There was something distinctly patronising in the way the witch patted at the space he had scrambled away from her side.

No, of all the benefits he hoped he might gain from this courtship and the challenge he had issues was not worth this one little bit. As soon as the sun begins to rise, he decided with absolute certainty, he would leave and never return again. It seemed quite fitting to flee across the Waste as the sun rose and before the heat grew to great, a new morning welcoming in a life where he intended to have no associating with the Witch of the Waste at all. This excited him just enough to make the smile - it felt so fake it was a marvel that it looked so earnest - that he traced onto his face seem convincing.

"Could you not come to me for a change?" asked he, fluttering his long eyelashes in a way that did not suggest that he was counting the minutes before he could slither out of there, "That would only be fair, would it not?"

Although she let out an indignant snort, the woman did lay herself down, resting her head in his lap in a way that was just a little too possessive for his personal liking. Trying to seem completely unfazed by the fact that she brushed her knuckles against the little wounds on his chest, wiping away the blood, he busied his hands with plaiting her hair, trying to actualise the 'busy hands busy mind' turn of phrase. He only had to play nice, far too much of a coward to even consider a confrontation that he could not escape from.

The two, each having given themselves to a fire demon, would have surely burned each other to cinders, leaving nothing at all behind.  
Howl did try sneak out in the morning, but that was far too easy. She had caught him, and she was not happy that he was going to leave her. All manner of words were thrown at each other, insults and magical, until his fate was sealed even as he fled into the Waste, cloak left behind and wholly forgotten, his life more important than an article of clothing with pockets full of all manner of wizardy material.

The Witch had gotten her claws into him, quite literally, and he was not going to get away that easily. She was vain, catty and most of all, she was powerful, and the curse that fell upon him meant the two were linked together no matter how far he ran, no matter how many times and ways he tried to slither out of his curse.


End file.
